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Wednesday, May 11, 2011

Oz jelly roll quilt, part 1+

Note: if you've read this entry before, please be aware that I've added an addendum as of November 2011. (section is below; just scroll down)

I've mentioned the Oz Jelly Roll quilt in passing in other posts, but it really deserves its own set of entries. It all started when Dear Daughter #2 was in Perth, Australia for a semester at Edith Cowan University. I had mentioned to her that should she buy some fabric in Australia, I would make her "something" from it. She bought this jelly roll, produced by Fabric Editions from their "Fabric Palettes" line.

After looking through a LOT of patterns and ideas, she finalized her decision on "Zen and the Jelly Roll", designed by Laura Paulu from the book, "Jelly Roll Inspirations".

The pattern calls for 1 Jelly Roll. We have one Jelly Roll.

The Jelly Roll in the pattern should have 40 strips. Our Jelly Roll has 20 strips. oops. It's not like we can dash out to the store and buy some more.

Design decision: our quilt will simply be half has large. :-) The original design has 20 blocks in a 4x5 block layout with borders, which results in a decently sized quilt at 66" x 78". Since I have half as many strips, I could only get 10 blocks ... and there is exactly one reasonable arrangement for that ... 2x5 blocks ... which results in a very long, narrow, skinny strip.

Not to worry, VERY WIDE side borders will fix it. :-) Several arrangements of side borders were presented to DD#2 and with her decision, this is where I am right now.

This quilt will finish around 44" x 60".

DD#2 likes vines, so in each side border, there will be an appliqued vine with flowers (flowers not shown at this point).

There are many techniques to making and appliquing narrow bias strips for vines. This is the method I am using for this quilt:

1. cut bias 1" wide
2. fold in half, wrong sides together and seam at 1/4" from the raw edge. (Yes, *wrong* sides together).
3. trim seam allowance in half
4. place raw edge of bias against the placement line, previously drawn on the base fabric
5. stitch over seamline stitching to attach bias to base fabric
6. pull the folded edge of bias over the seamline and cover the raw edge. Hand stitch in place. Alternatively, you could machine stitch the folded edge with top-stitching or blind hem stitch. In this case, I am preferring to hand-stitch.

oh my! I received a lovely comment from Laura Paulu herself (designer of this pattern)! Sadly, Laura is 'anonymous' so I couldn't contact her directly. I hope she comes back to read this addendum.

When I reviewed this post, I was appalled to see that I hadn't posted
the completed top with all of the applique! No, it's still not quilted
(along with a boatload of other tops) but it's on the List! :-) So,
without further ado, here's the finished top!

The first appliqued flower was the traditional sort ... constructed of individual, small pieces and hand stitched in place. I realized this was going to take me beyond forever to finish.

Then I remembered a long-ago technique called "Broderie Perse", which essentially is fussy cutting a pre-printed image and appliqueing it onto a different base fabric.

I combed my stash for appropriate floral fabric and came up with a number of candidates. These flowers were cut out and hand stitched onto the wide borders. It didn't turn out half badly. :-)

As I was creating the wide border strips, it occurred to me that it would be a Very Cool design feature of the cut off points of the blocks on the edge would actually emerge into the border itself. I carefully and PAINFULLY pieced each little triangle into the gray border. What an utter nightmare.

When it came to the print borders, it occurred to me .. what an idiot I was! ... I could have had the same effect but easier construction if the triangles were *Prairie Points*! Well, I wasn't about to undo then re-do the pieced triangles already in place, but I did make Prairie Points to extend into the print border *and* along the outer edge of the quilt. I'm going to need to be careful when I quilt this part of the quilt!

During the construction of the top, I collected some perfectly nice but small triangle units. Not being a person to waste a lovely pieced segment, I made a box throw pillow to coordinate with the quilt (whenever it gets quilted, that is!).

Here's the front of the throw pillow.

and the back.

As is usual with my throw pillows, this one also has a concealed zipper in the bottom boxing strip so the cover can be removed for laundering.

And I'm especially pleased with the way the corners of the pillow turned out ... they are SQUARE. It really annoys me when I see throw pillows with dogears for the corners. It's such an easy adjustment to the corner of the pattern to make sure that the finished pillow has square corners.

I'm *pretty* sure that I've already given the throw pillow to Dear Daughter #2 .. the Lover of All Things Purple. At least, I hope I did. Because if I didn't, I'm not sure where the pillow is!